Apple Inc. Assessment Paper Example

Introduction

The current mission statement of Apple is as follows. Apple designs the best personal computers (PC) in the world, Macs, as well as professional software, iLife, OS X, and iWork. Apple leads in the modern digital music revolution with its iTunes music store and iPods. It has reinvented the smartphones with its revolutionary App Store, iPhone, besides defining the future computing devices and mobile media world with iPad.

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Major Events in Apple's History and their Impacts to the Company

The cofounders of Apple, Steve Jobs, and Steve Wozniak launched the first Apple computer in Palo Alto, California in 1976 (Finkle and Michael 31). This step becomes the breakthrough period of the Apple Inc. The Apple II, with 1 MHz processor was then designed and mass produced in 1976. In 1980, Apple became a publicly traded company. In 1983, Lisa was introduced. It had a mouse screen icons and folders. The cost was too high ($10000) leading to its failure. The company introduced the Macintosh computers, which were quite affordable with innovative features like a built-in monitor, mouse, and a disk drive. The year 1985, Jobs resigned due to internal power wrangles and in 1986, John Sculley the former chief executive of Apple become the Apple's president. Jobs started the NeXT computer company, and purchased Lucasfilm's computer graphics division, calling it Pixar. Apple buys the NeXT Company in 1996, instating Jobs as the company advisor. Jobs heads Apple again in 1997 and this enables the revamping of Apple's product line. The President, Jobs then churned out colorful iMac desktops devices with drives and monitors in the same case in 1998. Apple introduced iBook or iMac in 1999. It also launched the first Apple retail store in Palo Alto besides introducing the portable music players and iPods. Another big event was opening iTunes (an online music store) in 2003, and the introduction of iPhone in the 2007 smartphone era. In 2010, the Apple president introduced iPad, the touchscreen tablets that became a huge hit in the market. Recently, in 2016, Apple announced the plans to introduce an Apple wristwatch.

Managers of Apple, Roles, Management Style and Points of View

The managers of Apple since its start have been Steve Jobs, John Sculley, and Gil Amelio, and Tim Cook. The three leaders served as the Chief Executive Officers of the Apple Inc., during different periods. The longest-serving Apple President was Steve Jobs.

Sculley preferred open architecture computers, for instance, Apple II, and recommended the selling of these products for home markets, education and small business that were less vulnerable to IBM. His point of view lacked expansiveness and competitiveness.

Jobs, on the contrary, favored the closed architecture Macintosh to be a business alternative to IBM. He had an innovative business strategy to ensure competition.

Gil Amelio, in 1995, officially began to license Macintosh ROM and Mac OS to the third party manufacturers. Amelio's intention was to enhance the market penetration and improve revenue for the company.

However, Jobs, after his reinstatement had a different viewpoint and he instead realizes the loophole in the licensing contracts of the Mac OS and Macintosh. He terminated the licenses and began the NeXT technology as the foundation of the Operating System called the Mac OS X (Finkle and Michael 31).

Jobs had a personal vision of bringing the best individual computing experience to all Apple users all over the world, through innovativeness in its internet, software, and hardware offerings. He maintained good relations with the followers and was able to make Apple successful. He was experienced in the field, appropriately rewarded employees, and retrieved Apple's financial position after its struggle.

Cook became the CEO of Apple after the death of Jobs. He assumes the innovativeness and competitiveness in the industry. He introduced the Apple Watch. Cook emphasizes the opportunity to sell the company's products to enterprises. Encourages employee giving, shares the limelight or publicity with top lieutenants, accommodates Wall Street with buybacks and dividends, and encouraged acquisition (bought the audio company Beats). However, Steve Jobs disdained opportunity to sell enterprises, Hogged the limelight, opposed buybacks and dividends, and eschewed huge acquisitions (Finkle and Michael 31).

Major Stakeholder of Apple and their Roles

The Apple stakeholders include the Apple's customers, employees, investors, and suppliers and distributors (Thompson 1). The suppliers play a huge role in influencing the objectives and aims a company can or cannot set. The suppliers understand well the market dynamics and enable agility and flexibility in responding to the business environment.

The role of the employees is to design and create Apple products. The satisfaction levels of employees can either positively or negatively impact Apple. The role of suppliers entails ensuring availability of raw materials in the company. The government of the U.S is also a major stakeholder that ensures that the company operates under a politically controlled environment, ensuring policies that favor the company. The Apple workers are basically the U.S workers since it is the government that provides the working space. The investors are the determinants of the social responsibilities of the business.

Ethical and Unethical Decisions of the Apple's Past

The ethical decision that Apple has previously made included the four integrity traits, which were upholding honesty, compliance with codes of conduct, and high services and products that demonstrate integrity in all business interactions.

An unethical decision that Apple previously encountered is the deprivation of privacy to the customer. In 2011, the customer location would be transmitted back to the apple main office through the company, regardless of even if the location feature was disabled (Ferrell and John 26).

The Apple's Organizational Culture, structure, and Design and the Success

The organizational culture entails top-notch excellence, innovation, creativity, moderate combativeness, and secrecy. The organizational culture of Apple is a key factor to its success. The organization culture seeks to determine capabilities in supporting transformations, new strategies, and policies. Apple allows employee development and integration into a culture that expedites rapid innovation. The innovation of Apple has seen in its products; Apple watches, iPad, iPhone, et cetera. These cultures contribute to the business strength.

The Apple's organization structure is hierarchical (Finkle and Michael 31). The structure embraces decentralization of decision making to some level to allow creativity and innovativeness at various levels. The resultant products of the Apple are results of the collaboration of the product-based groupings. The current structure is as follows. The Chief Executive Officer is the overall leader. The Vice Presidents follow in the order (the Senior Vice Presidents, Chief Designer Officer, and Chief Operating Officer). The last in the hierarchy are retail, internet software and service, software engineering, chief financial officer, hardware engineering, worldwide marketing, general counsel, and hardware technologies. The list also includes user interface design, industrial design, communication, social initiatives and policies, marketing communication, and worldwide human resources.

Overall Assessment of Apple

Apple Inc. has a well-organized management structure, founded by Steve Jobs, and updated by Tim Cook when he took over as the CEO in 2011. The company has grown to become a renowned computer hardware and software industry. The mission and vision of the company are enhanced by the Apple's innovativeness, and the major products are iMac, iPad, iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, et cetera. The company also upholds the positive corporate social responsibility, professional ethical policies, and stakeholder management.

Works Cited

Ferrell, Odies C., and John Fraedrich. Business ethics: Ethical decision making & cases. Nelson Education, 2015.Finkle, Todd A., and Michael L. Mallin. "Steve Jobs and Apple, Inc." Journal of the International Academy for Case Studies 16.7 (2010): 31.

Thompson, Andrew. "Apple Inc. Stakeholders: A CSR Analysis." Panmore Institute, 29 Jan. 2017, panmore.com/apple-inc-stakeholders-csr-analysis.